Apple’s New Research Complex to Have Massive Underground Auditorium

Apple, in new drawings it has submitted as part of the construction of a research and development complex near its corporate headquarters, is showing off a massive underground auditorium where it will presumably unveil new products.

The renderings submitted to the City of Cupertino, California, for the company’s soon-to-be-built Campus 2 facility also depict a parking garage for nearly 5000 cars.

The main structure, which will be mostly glass and from an aerial view look like a spaceship, won’t replace Apple’s existing headquarters. Instead, it will be a research facility for 13,000 employees and will allow for future growth via an allocation of up to 300,000 square feet of additional office space within the area.

Drawings posted on the City of Cupertino website show the underground auditorium will include not only a stage, backstage and seating area, but also a massive circular exhibition area. The plans also depict an above-ground parking structure which will accommodate 4648 vehicles; previous plans included underground parking.

The 175-acre area where Apple will build its Campus 2 facility is located on the former Hewlett Packard campus. You can visit the City of Cupertino website to see more renderings of what the project will look like.

Apple plans to demolish the existing buildings at the site and erect a 2.8 million square foot office, research and development complex that, in addition to the underground auditorium and parking garage, includes a fitness center, a mostly off-the-grid energy center and a thick layer of trees that will enshroud the four-story ring-shaped building. The circular structure will have huge walls of glass that let Apple employees look out from both sides onto park-like landscaping that includes jogging paths and walking trails.

Groundbreaking for the new facility is planned for later this year, with completion scheduled for 2015.

The late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, who proposed the project to the Cupertino City Council a year ago, had said Apple plans to keep its existing headquarters building at 1 Infinite Loop in Cupertino.